Facilities construction projects that are designed by teams of licensed engineering professionals are engineered with intentioned compliance to statutes and codes, and intense considerations given to safety, security, reliability and cost effectiveness.  Although too often neglected, designers consider operations, maintainability, constructability and sustainability.  It is usually the clients, within the bounds of statutes, who make the final decisions on how the above are integrated into final design and construction contracts.  Also, given the innate creativity of engineers, there are many possible solutions in all sections of the drawings and specifications.  Add differing site conditions, (weather, available utilities, physical threats, site specific vulnerabilities, environmental stewardship, statutes, site labor pool, etc.), a universal critical facility design may not be the best option for most clients and locations.  A least life-cycle-cost design or least cost of ownership design is different at every location.

I strongly advocate (1) reserving the title of engineer for licensed engineering professionals, (2) engineering or reengineering by teams of licensed engineering professionals, and (3) intensively engineered systems integration during every critical system or critical facility modification.

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Critical Facility Energy Engineering Challenges